


In Mind's Wake

by Thisisarealtagwhy



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Body Swap, Fluff, Freak Friday AU, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Langst, Panic Attacks, Space Dad Shiro (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:01:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21776434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thisisarealtagwhy/pseuds/Thisisarealtagwhy
Summary: “So, you’re telling me that you’re Shiro and Shiro is Lance?” Hunk asks, disentangling himself from Shiro.“Yup.” Lance says, hands on hips, the pose looks ridiculous in Shiro's usually serious body.(Freaky Friday)
Relationships: Lance & Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 278





	In Mind's Wake

**Author's Note:**

> okay this has a little couple of trigger warnings on it for self-harm and panic attacks, i really wanted to make this light hearted but was in a dark place when i did it lol, my writing tends to get angstier when im in that kind of a mood.  
> i wrote it partially listening to [this playlist ](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/33lIiKFXMd7a1sV7Rmy8A7) lol.  
> anyways, hope you can look past it and forgive me for it!!!

“What does this crystal look like again, princess?” Shiro asks, he doesn’t want to accidentally touch one of the other horrifying crystals that Coran has outlined in great detail.

Crystals that liquefy your insides, crystals that permanently paralyse you… there’s too many to list and it has Shiro a little more on edge than usual because the crystal they’re looking for looks almost identical to the others.

Allura sighs under her breath and brings the hologram up again, “As you can see, the determining feature is when your hand comes close to it, it should light up.” Coran explains, “It will be a dark light, kind of like your arm Shiro!”

Pidge grins maniacally, “With the use of Therbibus, we should be able to increase the castle’s efficiency by 3% and introduce a more improved weaponry system to it.”

Coran nods enthusiastically, “Therbibus was highly sought after 10 000 years ago due to its’ multiple uses. But due to its’ highly volatile nature, and the fact that it powers nearby crystals, its’ mostly been left unharvested, but I have complete faith in you paladins.”

“Pidge, I want you to remain as support on the surface of the mine, we won’t be able to reach the castle from our vantage point. Keith and Hunk will protect Pidge and the entrance of the mine.” Shiro nods to each, he knows that Pidge doesn’t need protection per se, but rather to keep an eye on enemy ships approaching. “Lance, you’re with me, you’re our sharpshooter and I’ll need your eyes to make sure we get the right crystal, I’ll use my prosthetic to put it into its container.”

Lance practically beams at Shiro, “Hell yeah! Let’s go get some glowing rocks.” It’s clear that he’s pleased with such a task, it reminds Shiro that he has to take Lance on solo missions more frequently, the boy thrives off independence and praise, something Shiro read right away about him.

He’s a very good people reader, he has to be, they’re in space, he has to trust his instincts.

Keith snorts, “Of course you would be excited about some crystals.”

“Don’t be jealous of me mullet, I know you’d much rather blow some shit up, you just don’t appreciate the smaller things in life.” Lance says with an airiness to his tone, Keith rolls his eyes, but a twitch of the lips belies his true feelings.

“Well I’m definitely jealous.” Hunk says with a grin, slinging an arm around Lance. “If you find any non-lethal cave roots, bring them back for me okay?”

“Of course, buddy.”

“Please bring back the right amount too.” Pidge implores, glasses glinting, eyes twinkling in excitement.

Lance’s eyes lose their own light for a moment and Shiro internally sighs, he’s going to have to deal with this at some stage, isn’t he? Pidge can’t be so blunt all the time and not expect it to blow up in their face.

“Voraxion had the most gorgeous empires built across it.” For a moment Allura’s eyes glow with the memory. “But I’m not picking up on any signs of life across its’ surface, regardless, please be careful paladins.”

“You got it princess.” Lance salutes.

“Alright paladins, to your lions, we’re within the planet Voraxions orbit.” Allura commands, each move to their respective stations and Shiro sucks in a breath, he has complete and utter faith in Lance’s capability but he has the tendency to get distracted.

He takes the hang-glider with a sense of unease curling within his stomach, it feels like something is going to go wrong but he doesn’t exactly know what.

The lions roar in unison as they enter Voraxions atmosphere, through the green clouds (something about chemicals reacting with one another, Shiro doesn’t get it) they descend upon a crystallite city.

Lance gasps in awe, even in ruin, the city is gorgeous, houses, skyscrapers built from crystals of varying shades, each glittering heavenly in the blood red sun of the Urbion system.

Even so, each suffers structural damage, cracked along the middles, chipping occurring further to the top, “What happened here?” Keith murmurs, more of a rhetorical question than anything.

“I don’t know.” Allura’s voice crackles and warps amongst static, making Shiro’s heart thump painfully in stress, they’ll be fine as long as they have contact with Pidge.

“I see the mine.” Lance takes pointe, leading the group towards essentially a hole in the ground, it leads downwards into an impenetrable darkness.

Lance and Shiro park the lions, “Alright, we’ll be back soon.” Shiro says, the containment slung across his back.

Together, they begin the descent into the inky darkness of the shaft, illuminated by only crystals lighting the walls, “Don’t touch any of them alright? Not without telling Pidge.”

“Of course I won’t.” There’s a level of hurt in the boys voice but Shiro doesn’t apologise for it.

The crystals begin to space out and that’s the only warning for the shaft to spread out to a more open space, the crystals pulse a deeper pink here, but aside from a meter of light, they don’t penetrate the darkness of the mine.

Shiro’s hairs prickle as _something_ passes over them, a flash of power.

“Did… you feel that?” Lance asks and Shiro hears him audibly gulp.

“Yeah, stick close.” Shiro commands, he shines his suit light towards the darkness, they continue walking, very quickly three different tunnels present themselves, each lined with the same glowing crystals.

Shiro almost sighs, “We don’t know which one to go down…” he bites his lip, they can’t risk splitting up, but it would be highly beneficial to do so.

Lance points at each of them, “Eenie, meenie, minie, mo.” He shrugs and starts walking down it.

Shiro follows, there’s not much else to do, to make sure they don’t come back the wrong way, he gouges and x into the ground with his prosthetic.

“So…” Lance is bored, Shiro can tell by the way he fiddles with his hands and his bayard, itching to do _something_. “How did you and Keith meet?”

“What?” Shiro startles, out of everything to be asked, he didn’t expect to be asked _that._

“How did you and Keith meet? I’m just curious y’know? The infamous Shiro meets a hot-headed mullet.” Lance huffs a laugh.

The tunnel is dipping in front of them but Shiro pays it no heed as it levels out, the crystals begin pulsing a different colour, “Well, I met him at his school, he completely beat everyone’s scores on the simulator and even though his teacher didn’t want him to, I wanted him to become a pilot.” His tone grows wistful. “I taught him everything I know, and then some.”

“Was he just as hot-headed as he is now?”

“Yeah, and then some.” Shiro chuckles, thinking of the surly kid who got into fights at anything. “He’s my brother.”

The silence grows, “What about your family? How many siblings do you have?”

“I’ve got four siblings, Veronica, Luis, Rachel and Marco, and Lisa is Luis’s wife, so she’s also my sister. We live with my abuela and abuelo in Florida, but we’re originally from Cuba, we had a restaurant there…”

Shiro lets Lance continue, half-listening to his conversation, keeping an eye on where they’re going, the tunnel widens out again and Lance falls back into silence. “You miss them a lot, don’t you?”

“Yeah…”

This cave is filled with various other crystals, each pulsating colours of the rainbow, Shiro allows his flesh arm to hover over each in turn, trying to find the right crystal, Lance covering the other side of the cave, “Bingo bango!” Lance cries out as the crystal he hovers over glows a deep purple colour. “Shiro I found it!”’

“Good work Lance.” Shiro says, striding to where the sniper is standing, hand hovering over the surface of a shimmering purple rock. “Pidge, do you copy?”

Nothing but static, ignoring the prickle of unease across his spine, Shiro goes to pick up the rock when-

A bright light enters his vision, completely blinding him, all encompassing, the light reaching down through his flesh and metal, straight to his very soul - he thinks it’s his soul because it glows and hums along with him and it hurt, hurts, _hurts,_ when the light touches it – Shiro gasps in pain, and vaguely he hears Lance cry out in pain as well, and Shiro aches to help the boy but he can’t do anything.

His body seizes, lock-rigid, as pain spasms through him, white hotness lances through his abdomen, as if he’s been run through with a hot poker, through the blinding white, darkness creeps over his vision like a crappy film before distantly he feels the pain fall away like water, leaving random spasms in his chest.

Thankfully, he is claimed by the darkness, losing consciousness.

Wakefulness is a cursing, the pain coursing through his being once more, his back arches futilely, trying to dislodge the sense of _wrongness_ and regain balance in a nebulous vortex of absolute pain.

He gasps out loud and that’s when he knows something is wrong, because that _does_ not sound like him. “Shiro?” A low pitched voice calls out through the darkness, shadows curling about the glowing crystals Allura had sent them in for.

“Lance?” Shiro jolts upright, groping forward until he makes contact with a sturdy head, something isn’t right, that isn’t his voice and he knows that tuft of hair-

“Shiro!” Lance cries out but it isn’t _his voice,_ and the sense of wrongness returns as he comes face to face with-

Himself.

It’s the same face, same arm, same hair, the armour black and suddenly it feels like Shiro can’t breathe, his hands tremble as he lifts his completely flesh arm.

 _This can’t be real, this can’t be real, this is some… fever dream, it can’t be real,_ Foggily, he can hear Lance shouting at him with his voice but it doesn’t help the situation.

“Shiro! Come on man, take deep breaths with me okay?” Lance’s breaths are shaky but sure as he guides Shiro out of the panicky state he’d dug himself into.

“Sorry.” He mumbles as soon as he regains his breath. “This is…”

“Weird.” Lance finishes, lifting his prosthetic arm and Shiro feels even worse about the situation, Lance shouldn’t have to carry the burden of Shiro’s prosthetic arm, of how it uncomfortably pulls at his skin when it’s been a long day or how it-

“Shiro, it’s okay.” Lance is speaking again, rubbing his back with the flesh arm, Lance rises and reaches down for Shiro, steadying him on his feet. “Let’s get back to the others, forget about the crystal.”

“Okay.” He grips his arm (wow he really _does_ have some insane muscles) and hauls himself to his feet, his legs are shaky and when the shudders die down Lance nods back to the way they came. Shiro takes one step forward and immediately stumbles.

“Shit I forgot how long your legs are.” Shiro’s tall yes, but Lance is lanky, and whilst the muscle memory is there, he is viscerally aware of it, which basically makes it cancel out.

Lance laughs, something that sounds foreign coming from his own mouth, “Well, your legs are shorter than mine, it’s definitely weird, and the prosthetic kinda throws my balance.”

“Sorry.” Shiro says softly.

“No, dude, _never_ apologise for it, just gotta relearn how to walk.” Lance says with a reassuring smile.

“We should go. Find somewhere that we can reach Pidge.” Shiro says, finding his feet once more and balancing for a few moments before he nods, he’s going to get the hang of this as long as he isn’t aware of how long Lance’s legs are.

He looks over to Lance, he definitely seems to be taking this better than Shiro ever could, he’s struck with envy at the ease.

“This is probably the weirdest thing we’ve ever been through…” Lance mutters, looking down at the prosthetic again.

“Yeah.” His mouth is dry as he looks at himself in ways that he thought would be impossible, the scar across the bridge of his nose does look insanely cool.

“I think being in your body has unlocked the _‘calm cool and collected leader’._ ” Lance says, deepening his voice.

Shiro almost chuckles were it not for the blind panic still vaguely gripping onto him, it feels like he’s about to me dragged down beneath its waves.

“Wow, I really don’t have an ass.” Lance says, quite forlornly.

Shiro doesn’t know what to say to that, but his mouth slips up and says, “Keith carries twice the cake to make up for you.”

Lance’s mouth gapes open, such a look surreal on Shiro’s face. “Did you just...?”

“Now _that_ is not something I ever want to say again, do you think we might have had a psychological switch too?” Shiro asks, ignoring Lance’s blush at that.

“Maybe, but to what extent?” Lance says. “I thought the p-” his mouth shuts with an audible click.

“The panic attack things are something I get too.” Shiro says softly.

“Really?” Lance’s eyes widen.

“Mhm, sometimes I just overthink things and before I know it, I can’t breathe, Coran’s working on something for me to hopefully calm me down.” Shiro admits. “If we figure something out for me, then we can figure something out for you too.”

They traverse in silence, but Shiro can see Lance looking at his own body in awe, so is Shiro, because they will never (hopefully) get an opportunity like this again, and it’s _weird,_ to be travelling in someone else’s body.

Lance’s legs are longer, he’s _lighter,_ and his skin feels weirdly lighter, and smooth, he’s felt his face quite a few times and each he’s struck with the weird _intimacy_ of the actions, it feels intrusive.

And his arm, it’s so damn _weird_ having something flesh and blood, something so light, he catches himself marvelling at it too many times, subconsciously running his other hand across it.

Eventually light begins to spill from the end of the tunnel and Lance taps the side of his helmet, “Pidge, do you copy?”

“Yes!” There’s a frantic key to their tone. “Where have you guys been? I think the crystals interfered with our connection.”

“There’s been…” Shiro pauses, “A complication, we weren’t able to get the crystals.”

Pidge groans, “Seriously?”

“Yeah.” They reach the outside of the mineshaft and Shiro blinks rapidly in the brightness of the red sun.

Shiro can hear Pidge muttering over the line, “Seriously, one job.”

Hunk lands his lion near them, and immediately gives Shiro a full-bodied hug, Shiro doesn’t duck away in time, entrapped within Hunk’s strong embrace, it’s… nice. “Lance, buddy, you good? I thought something terrible happened.”

Lance giggles and that’s enough of a warning for the rest of the team, Keith eyes Shiro with suspicion, “Shiro?”

“Well, funnily enough, that isn’t Shiro, I am.” Shiro says. “We were in the cave, looking for Therbibus, and I _thought_ we found it but when I touched it… it did this.”

“So, you’re telling me that you’re Shiro and Shiro is Lance?” Hunk asks, disentangling himself from Shiro.

“Yup.” Lance says, hands on hips, the pose looks ridiculous in Shiro's usually serious body.

“¿ _Mi hermano, dondé nos encotramos?”_ Hunk says, looking to Lance.

He laughs, “ _Estabas atrapado en un árbol.”_

Hunk looks between the two carefully, “This is so weird.”

“You’re telling me…” Shiro mutters.

“We should go back to the Castle.” Keith says, he eyes Lance with a weird type of disgust, which sends a pang of emotion through Shiro. “Hopefully Coran will know what to do.”

“Uhh, how are we going to get Blue and Black back up there?” Pidge asks.

“We can try to see whether they recognise us?” Lance suggests, heading for Blue.

“They’re magic sentient lions, hopefully they’re equipped to deal with a freaky Friday situation.” Shiro agrees, heading for Black, he ignores the cries from Pidge and Hunk that he knows what Freaky Friday is and Keith’s admittance to not knowing what it was.

The cockpit feels familiar and unfamiliar at the same time but still _warmth_ courses through him. “Black, it’s me.”

He feels her on his mind, warmth and love permeating the atmosphere and for a moment he’s taken aback by the laughter, Black is laughing at him, “That’s not nice.” He murmurs.

_Wrong body, same mind._

And the cockpit lights up, Shiro breathes a sigh of relief as he adjusts his seat to better suit Lance’s body type, Black leans back and _roars,_ and he can faintly hear Blue doing the same thing.

He smiles, happy that even if his body is wrong, Black recognises him, he truly appreciates it.

“Alright!” Lance cries out, disconcerting to hear his own voice cry out like that.

“Definitely weird…” He hears Keith say.

They begin the short flight to the castle, “Coran, we have a problem.” Shiro says, opening up a line with the engineer.

“Number 3? What are you doing in Black? Is everyone alright?” Coran tilts his head, panic seeping through his exterior.

“I’ll explain when we land, but can you please meet us in the hangar?” Shiro pleads.

Coran considers him for a moment before nodding, “Alright! I’ll see you there shortly!”

The lions take their respective spots in the hangar and Shiro leaps from Black’s cockpit, he sure hopes that the elder Altean will know what the hell is up with their bodies, as much as he enjoys having a flesh arm, he’d much prefer to be in his own body, and he wouldn’t wish having his arm onto any of the paladins.

“Shiro, are you good?” Lance asks, arms crossed in contemplation.

“I’m fine, I’ll be better when we swap back.” He huffs a laugh, but catches the emotion in the youngers eyes. “I’m sure having that arm is weird.”

“Sure is!” Lance says, flexing the prosthetic. “But it’s probably for the best that I don’t know how to heat it up.” As he speaks the arm begins to glow. “Uh oh.”

Shiro freezes in his place, he doesn’t know _how_ he commands his arm, just that it happens, surprisingly enough, Hunk is the one who moves closer to Lance, “You’re going to have to calm down _mi hermano,_ can you do that for me? Big breaths, in, and out, look at me, slowly, I want you to focus on your arm being cold. Can you do that for me Lance?”

Lance looks at Hunk, breaths beginning to even out, slowly, every so slowly, as Hunk continues to speak to Lance, the prosthetic begins to cool down, eventually losing its’ purple glow.

“I came as quick as I could!” Coran shouts, rushing into the room with medical equipment at his heel. “Who got hurt?”

Shiro looks tiredly around at his team, “There’s been a complication, the therbibus, it swapped Lance and I around. I’m Shiro, and that’s Lance.”

Coran pauses for a moment, “Quiznak, I thought you wouldn’t have run into it, but it is possible that the therbibus you were planning on bringing back was actually amphor.”

“What the hell is amphor?” Keith asks.

“It is a highly volatile substance, one that can quite literally do anything, the anything in this case is swapping these two paladins.” Coran says, fiddling with his moustache. “I’ll have to run some tests but hopefully we can swap you two back, number 5, number 2, if you’ll help me out, I think it will run more smoothly. In the meantime, you two just sit tight, you’ll be back to normal in a tick!”

Shiro lets out a sigh and rubs his hair, this is quite literally the weirdest thing to ever happen to him, and that includes getting chosen to pilot a lion from outer space, “I can’t believe we’re literally living in Freaky Friday.” Lance whispers.

Shiro sighs again, “Except you’re not my moody teenage daughter, and I’m not marrying Mark Harmon…”

Lance gapes at him, “I did not expect _you_ to have watched Freaky Friday… you’re like… thirty!”

Keith snorts, looking away innocently when Shiro sends him a glare. “I’m 24 okay?! I’m not old!”

“Okay grandpa.” Lance says with a laugh.

“I swear to god Lance I will discontinue your facial routine.”

Lance gasps, hands travelling to Shiro’s heart, “You wouldn’t dare give me wrinkles…”

“I would to complete the ‘grandpa’ persona.” Shiro threatens. “Imagine you but with wrinkles and grey hair.”

Lance shudders, “That’s so evil…”

Keith goes to train, Shiro can see the nervous energy in his frame so he doesn’t question it.

The two move to the loungeroom (Shiro internally calls it the loungeroom, he can’t remember what Allura called it) to be more comfortable. Lance squirms for several minutes on the lounge before blushing and sighing.

“What Lance?”

Lance blushes again, “I _really_ have to pee.”

Shiro’s breathing stutters, he _really_ doesn’t want to deal with this, because as soon as Lance brought it up, he can feel his own bladder contract.

“What do we do?” He questions, hoping to find the answer in the roof, he resolutely doesn’t look at Lance, he doesn’t want to see the discomfort on the boys face, and he’s the one that’s in a hormonal teenagers body, he feels… _gross._

“Do you want to do a face mask to pass the time?” Lance asks nervously. “But I _really_ have to go.”

“It’s okay.” Shiro says, even if it isn’t, he trusts Lance with his life but this isn’t something he wanted to share with the boy, while it had been normal to bathe naked with others in his home town, it was something frowned upon in America, and for the first time he’s hit with the dysphoria of being in a different body.

Before, he’d been able to ignore it because there had been an end goal, make it back to the team, make sure that they’re alright, now… he is hit with the full brunt of it.

“It’s okay… I have to as well.” Shiro mutters, but he still feels disgusting, this shouldn’t be happening, if he just pretends its his own body then it shouldn’t be too hard… just don’t look.

“Just- uh, close our eyes?” Lance asks and Shiro is hit again with the fact that Lance has undoubtedly never purposefully bathed with strangers naked, is not used to the sense of ease it used to fill Shiro with, now, with how scarred he is, all he feels is unease, but hopefully he can do this.

“Yeah.”

They travel to the communal bathroom in stifling, uncomfortable silence.

“Alright, better get this over and done with…” Lance says, shuffling.

Shiro finishes his own business and waits for Lance to re-emerge, he does so, blushing furiously, again, Shiro is hit with another bout of unease, he’s sweating, no thanks to the armour.

“We should probably change too.” Shiro says.

“Yeah.” Lance perks up. “We should definitely do face masks to pass the time too.”

Shiro nods, he doesn’t really mind, he has never done one, but Adam had always tried to tell him to moisturise.

“Alright.” Lance enters his room and picks up a few clothes for Shiro to change into.

He does so quickly, not wanting to linger, but his eyes catch on Lance’s thighs, littered with scars, his hands shake as he traces over them, not quite believing his eyes. His eyes prickle with tears, he’s going to have to address this, they’re not fresh, but they’re not old. He should have known, he should have known, he should hav-

“Shiro?”

He wipes the back of his hand across his eyes, “Yeah, I’m coming.”

He chooses a different set of clothes for Lance, standing in contemplative silence, Lance picks out a couple of masks for them to do and they return to the loungeroom.

Lance carefully peels the mask out of the packaging, massaging it onto Shiro’s face, “Lance.” Shiro says as he applies the one Lance wants.

Lance’s eyes are downcast, “Look, I’m sorry.”

Shiro stutters for a moment, “For what?”

“The scars? That’s what you’re disappointed about right?” Lance asks, still not raising his head.

Shiro chokes for a moment, throat closing over, “I’m not disappointed… I’m worried about you. Why exactly did you do it?”

Lance shrugs and picks at the hem of Shiro’s shirt, “Things get too much sometimes… it wasn’t as bad when I was living with my family but when I moved out… uh, I feel like I deserve it, y’know? I feel weak and like I’m replaceable…” The last part is mumbled out but Shiro’s heart sinks with it.

Shiro opens his arms and settles Lance’s smaller body around his own, the discomfort is strong but Shiro tries to communicate as much familial love into the hug as possible, “You _don’t_ deserve that Lance, you’re the strongest, bravest person I know, and you’ll always have a place on our team, remember? You’re the sharpshooter.”

Lance’s breathing shudders, Shiro feels it against his head and he tightens the hug, Lance tentatively puts his arms back around his and quietly Shiro can feel tears leak onto his shirt, “Thanks Shiro.” It’s weird hearing his voice so husky, Shiro hardly ever allows himself to cry, too much to do.

Shiro leans back, looking Lance in the eyes (did he always have that many wrinkles?), “Lance, please never do this again, if you ever feel the urge to hurt yourself, come to me, we’ll work something out.”

Lance nods, “I will.”

Shiro wants to believe Lance will, but something in his heart tugs that no, Lance won’t.

Shiro begins wiping Lance’s face mask off, cut off by Allura arriving in the room, she pauses at the sight of their fearless leader with cream smeared over his face. “Paladins, I’ve heard of your… predicament. I think that Coran has come up with a solution.”

“Thank god.” Lance says, “No offence, Shiro, but I’m done with being an old man.”

Shiro splutters, “I am _not_ an old man!”

“Basically are.”

Allura turns heel from them, eliciting silence from the pair.

Keith wanders out of the training room with them, “Come up with a solution?”

“Yes, we are on our way to perform the switch again.” Allura nods to Keith whilst she leads them to the infirmary, where Coran, Pidge and Hunk are gathered around, “Coran came up with a solution.” Hunk says excitedly. “It’s really cool actually, but we’ve reverse engineered the amphor to come up with an effect that will swap you both back.”

“Or alternatively, it could shoot both of your quintessence’s into the universe.” Pidge mumbles from their laptop.

Shiro’s heart leaps, “Wait a m-”

“But I’m sure it won’t!” Coran says, his face not very convincing. “Both of you please lay down on a bed, you’ll probably get knocked out in the process.”

The pair do as commanded, taking one last look at each’s bodies, “This has been an experience I never want to go through again, no offence.” Shiro says, taking one last look at his body whilst prepping for the immense pain he remembers from the first time they swapped.

“Alright, Keith, if you’ll inject Shiro’s body, I’ll hold Lance down. It has to be simultaneous, okay?” Coran says, uncharacteristically serious.

Keith nods, equally serious, “We’ll go on three.” Coran says. “1… 2… 3!”

The needle plunges into Shiro’s neck and he arches off the bed as liquid fire is released into his veins, his mouth gapes wordlessly for a few moments before he collapses into a familiar darkness, he sees Lance’s body, he must be in his own.

Shiro tries to move closer but suddenly everything ripples, as if he’s disturbed a still lake and he begins to fall.

His senses fall away again… he feels like he’s floating on a bed of warm pudding, slowly tugging him into it’s grasp, further and further…

Awareness comes to him slowly, as if he’d been in a deep slumber, but as quickly as he wakes, reality slams back into him, the aches and pains that resonate through his body are back again, “Oh thank god.” Shiro says.

“I’m me again!” Lance says, and Shiro looks over to see him marvelling at his hands.

Pidge and Coran high five, “Thank goodness that worked!! You both could have been floating through the quintessence plane for the rest of eternity.”

Lance pales a little at that, “Remember what I said, alright?” Shiro asserts, looking at the younger.

“Yeah, sure Shiro.”

“Alright! This calls for a party, I’ll start cooking!” Hunk says, “That was seriously so weird.”

“Yeah, sure was.” Lance says softly.


End file.
